Old Fashioned Roses

I don't grow many old-fashioned roses in my garden - yet! I'm interested in trying out some more, though - and visits to old-fashioned rose gardens always inspire me to write huge lists.

I'm finally learning not to be greedy about requiring all my roses to repeat flower. I love the history which accompanies old roses - many are named after real people from history, too. Eventually I hope to have many more varieties on show.

And why not? I have plenty of space for new garden areas, plenty of sunshine and fresh air, and some good comprehensive old rose catalogues. Pity about the lack of money!

In late spring I think my most favourite old-fashioned rose is Mutabilis. Then as summer progresses Raubritter always takes my eye. And Crepuscule is such a well behaved and well-groomed climber whatever the season...

It's so hard to choose the best one. I hope you'll enjoy my modest collection, which I promise will soon get bigger!

Banksia Lutea...
Tue 1st Nov 2005

My Banksia Lutea rose - a yellow Banksia - started life as a small cutting. It was nipped (oops) from a bush I saw on a country garden tour.

Raubritter Rose...
Wed 29th Dec 2004

Raubritter is a beautifully cupped old-fashioned pink rose, which I first saw growing at Lyddington (a garden filled with old roses in rural Canterbury, New Zealand).

Honorine de Brabant Striped Rose...
Thu 16th Dec 2004

My favorite striped rose is Honorine de Brabant. She started life unfairly squashed into the shady JAM garden, rudely kept in place by a wooden cage. Now she is much happier in the sunny Dog-Path Garden over the water race.

Complicata Rose...
Wed 1st Dec 2004

Complicata is a once-flowering old-fashioned rose I grow in the messy garden in front of my (equally messy) glass-house. It's a rose that likes to spread out - a well behaved scramble sets its large single pink flowers off nicely.

Reine des Violettes...
Wed 1st Dec 2004

Reine des Violettes (Queen of the Violets) is one of the old-fashioned roses I grow. She has been shifted around a fair bit, and at the moment lives near the woodshed underneath a variegated elm. This rose has a beautiful fragrance.

Crepuscule...
Sat 20th Nov 2004

The soft apricot rose Crepuscule contributes so much to a garden - it’s thornless, and the new growth is clean and reddish in colour, so there’s no desperate need to dead-head it.

Mutabilis...
Fri 30th Apr 2004

Mutabilis is never a neat manicured rose, and its flowers seem to have been scattered over the bush, all in different states of growth or decay. They remind me of a swarm of butterflies resting between flights.